The Heritage Loto, led by Stéphane Bern, granted 300,000 euros to the Tuck Foundation, which owns the Vert-Mont estate, in Rueil-Malmaison (Hauts-de-Seine).
This aid will make it possible to finance an “Artists' Village” project which is to be set up in the outbuildings of the Château de Vert-Mont.
These listed outbuildings are in an advanced state of ruin and can only be renovated identically.
It is less well known than its neighbor Malmaison, once occupied by Joséphine de Beauharnais.
But the Château de Vert-Mont in Rueil-Malmaison (Hauts-de-Seine) has assets to show off.
Built by Gustave d'Eichthal between 1855 and 1857 on old plots of the Malmaison estate, it is perched on a small hill overlooking a pretty pond.
In this haven of greenery of 6 hectares are also very beautiful outbuildings, but in an advanced state of disrepair.
It is to restore these buildings that the Heritage Foundation has decided to grant 300,000 euros from the Stéphane Bern Heritage Loto to another foundation, the Tuck Foundation, which owns the estate.
As we are talking about the Stéphane Bern mission, a little historical reminder is in order.
In 1898, Edward Tuck, a wealthy American businessman, and his wife acquired the Vert-Mont estate where they settled before embarking on extensive sponsorship activities.
In 1903, he had the Stell hospital built, named after his wife, in Rueil-Malmaison, which he then donated to the State.
He also donated his collection of works of art to the city of Paris, thus giving his name to a gallery in the Petit-Palais.
An orangery that threatens ruin
After the death of Edward Tuck in 1938, the estate passed to his niece and suffered from English occupation during the Second World War and a general lack of maintenance.
In 1954, Vert-Mont was bought by a group of researchers including Madeleine Eristov who decided, in view of the maintenance costs, to sell it to a foundation so that it could become, as Edward Tuck wrote, "a research center of a very high level reserved for a small number of eminent specialists in the field of science, technology and economy on a world scale”.
In 1992, the Tuck Foundation was born, backed by the French Petroleum Institute (IFP), based in Rueil-Malmaison.
If the castle was renovated in the early 2000s, the outbuildings are in a sorry state, hence the appeal to the Heritage Foundation.
Thus the orangery, a magnificent building of around sixty square meters can only hold up with wooden props.
The metal windows no longer have a single pane intact while pieces of the vault lie on the ground.
"The orangery is in such poor condition that we're going to have to put everything on the ground and start from scratch," explains Marco Di Michelis, who is in charge of managing IFP's assets and has agreed to take charge of the candidacy of the site to the Bern mission.
The project of an "Artists' Village"
The estate also has stables which are distinguished by two stone horse heads fixed to the facade.
Inside magnificent stalls in wood and wrought iron.
And just opposite the stables, the coachmen's pavilion in two perfectly symmetrical parts, covered with a decorative coating of fake bricks and with an overhanging roof.
While the exterior is slowly crumbling, the interior has been ravaged by a fire caused by a tiller parked in the carriage space.
The purpose of the renovation of these outbuildings is to set up an "Artists' Village", inspired by the Villa Medici in Rome, and intended to house "permanently workshops and accommodation for artists 'in temporary residence' [ painters, sculptors, photographers, visual artists, designers, etc.] as well as periodic exhibitions and school visits,” says the Tuck Foundation.
The public will thus be able to have access to the estate, which was only the case on rare occasions such as Heritage Days, the castle being for the moment reserved for event marketing.
"The goal is to open it to the public, anyway, to apply for the Bern mission, the project must have an impact, cultural in our case, on the territory", explains Marco Di Michelis.
Will there be a Bern impact at the level of the Drac?
This aid from the Heritage Foundation is a "double financial boost", rejoices Marco Di Michelis.
“First because we hoped to receive 150,000 euros and then because it almost assures us of the support of the Drac [regional directorate of cultural affairs].
Indeed, the renovation project is estimated at 1.2 million euros.
300,000 euros were therefore obtained via the Bern mission and an additional 100,000 euros from the Heritage Foundation via sponsorship from AXA.
Two-thirds of the funding that our project manager hopes to obtain from the Drac, the Hauts-de-Seine department and the Ile-de-France region is therefore missing.
However, the approval of the first is required to submit its file to the other two.
But “often, when we obtain the Bern mission, we have the Drac because the Drac is co-decision maker of the Bern mission”,
says Marco Di Michelis.
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Finally, as the estate has been listed as a Historic Monument since 1994, we can't do just anything in terms of renovation.
The foundation is therefore in the process of selecting a heritage architect who will be “guarantor of formal rehabilitation”, specifies our interlocutor.
Moreover, the Drac requires the presence of such an architect to validate the file.
"A marathon with a series of stages" that Marco Di Michelis hopes to complete next fall.
To then attack the work.
It is therefore not immediately that the calm of the Vert-Mont estate will be disturbed by the cries of school groups.
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stephane bern
Paris
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